Western Caribbean 1/28/2006 - Comments?

[DavidPJ]

We just returned from the Western Caribbean cruise (1/28/06 - 2/4/06), which was our first DCL cruise. We really enjoyed it and I was curious what others who were on this cruise thought about it.

Did anyone notice the engines being stopped and started between 5:30PM and 7PM as we were leaving Castaway Cay friday night? Several times Magic came to a stop and drifted.

 

[Evil Queen 2]

This was our 3rd cruise and we loved it! Really enjoyed the party and fireworks. Best part we enjoyed was our cell phones not working

The engine thing leaving Castaway ~ they were doing a scheduled test of the side thruster engines. Making sure that each side would power up correctly and to a certain level. You noticed how we moved in a circle for a bit, then stopped and started moving back in the opposite direction. According to the crew member we talked with they test different things on just about every cruise, some things the cruisers notice, some they don't. Like the elevator testing on ship during the late morning at Castway.

 

[disneylady]

We also were on the Magic. When the ship stopped and began drifting, we called Guest Services and they explained the thruster test. Apparently, it has to be done every two months and can only be done when leaving Castaway Cay. I, personally, felt that an announcement should have been made from the Captain throughout the PA system.

This was our second cruise. We weren't impressed with the character photo ops. THey were only out for about 15 minutes and even if you were in line, once that 15 minutes passed, you were out of luck. I would have liked for them to post which characters were going to be out when in the Navigator.

We had airline problems and a kid in our party almost died in Nassau, but overall, I have very few problems w/Disney. Also, Shirley's baskets from The Perfect Gift were a definite rip off and did not include the items that I had requested when speaking w/them over the phone. Definitely, won't recommend them.

 

[DavidPJ]

Thanks for the explanation about the thrusters. I agree there should have been an announcement regarding the test, or even a brief note in the Navigator about it.

I also thought the character meetings were too brief and chaotic. What really surprised us was the lack of roaming characters. Unfortunately our dining was mostly in Parrot Cay, which most of the time you would not know you were in a Disney ship in this dining room. We expected characters to be roaming through the dining room and throughout the ship at all times, but this wasn't the case. Of course there were times where we did see unexpected characters, but I guess we just expected it more often.

 

[WldWcnWmn]

When we were on our last cruise (2004) they tested the horn while we were on the beach at Castaway Cay. They hit the horn once, then twice and after the CM's on the beach said it was just testing (some families thought it was an emergency call to return to the ship) everytime the horn went off (a total of nine times) everyone on the beach cheered! It was so cute to hear the horn and then hear everyone on the beach cheer (all seven times) The CM's told us later that they can only do this at CC as other ports pose horn testing difficulty.

 

[mzbiz1]

Disneylady-You wrote "Also, Shirley's baskets from The Perfect Gift were a definite rip off and did not include the items that I had requested when speaking w/them over the phone. Definitely, won't recommend them."

I'm surprised to hear this as I've only heard good things about Shirley's baskets. I ordered one for our cruise next week. What did you request and what did you end up getting?

 

[dlf246]

This was our second cruise. We weren't impressed with the character photo ops. THey were only out for about 15 minutes and even if you were in line, once that 15 minutes passed, you were out of luck. I would have liked for them to post which characters were going to be out when in the Navigator.

What? I have seen posts recommending checking the navigator for character photo ops. Have they stopped publishing that info?

 

[GhostlyHitchhiker]

I also just got off the 1/28 Magic and the character appearances were posted on the front page of the Navigators every day.

My entire party (16 of us) had a MAGICal time. The Pirate Party was a lot of fun. We were sad our Castaway Cay excursion was cancelled, but we ended up having fun getting our Jolly Roger kite stuck in a tree instead. Hmm, wonder if it's still there...

 

[4Goofys4Dis]

We were also on the 1/28 sailing of the Magic and I too was dissapointed that the character appearances were not posted in the Navigator (it was listed when they were but not who they were and how long they would each be there). The only way we could find out was goint to the Atrium lobby and it was posted daily. We were dissapointed that there weren't more characters roaming once in awhile.

But I have to say the weather was PERFECT and the seas were very calm - we couldn't have gotten better weather.

We ordered 2 of Shirley's baskets, they were beautiful! Although I did not get exactly what I ordered, she did seem to substitute it with something just as nice. I was happy with it, but if there is something VERY specific that you'd like, I'd suggest making it VERY clear to her on the phone!

Disneylady - We were RIGHT down the hall from you in cabin 6526 and LOVED your door - everytime we passed I had to smile!!!

 

[lbgraves]

The general time frames for character meet & greets are posted in the navigator. At the bottom of the box it says:

For more information dial 7-PALS (7-7257)
Daily updates available on the Atrium monitor.

This is where you are able to get the actual breakdown for each character that will be seen during that time frame along with where they will be located. That includes the characters that "roam" around the ship. That is all planned ahead of time. I call that number every evening after getting the kids into bed to get the next day's schedule.

 

[mousefamily]

We were also on the Western Jan. 28 and had a wonderful time. We were blessed with awesome weather and just a great trip overall. Our servers were Cornwall and Ian and they were super. We went ahead and booked again for next year and we weren't the only ones. Everytime we went by the reservation area there were at least 5 people waiting. Did anyone on here rebook?

For anyone wondering whether or not to do a Disney Cruise, I highly recommed it. It is truely magical.

 

[mommasita]

Disneylady-You wrote "Also, Shirley's baskets from The Perfect Gift were a definite rip off and did not include the items that I had requested when speaking w/them over the phone. Definitely, won't recommend them."

I'm surprised to hear this as I've only heard good things about Shirley's baskets. I ordered one for our cruise next week. What did you request and what did you end up getting?

I am surprised as well, and would love to hear more..Have ordered with Shirley more than once, and was OVERsatisfied (sp?) As well as many on this board..

 

[musicgirl]

Mommasita, I have also heard wonderful reviews about Shirley's baskets. Perhaps there was a misunderstanding or a mix-up.

Don't they also have an electronic board by guest services that has the times for the characters?

 

[GSCM_DisneyScout]

We just got off the cruise also. It was our first cruise and my whole family loved it. I asked my kids which they would preffer a trip to WDW or another cruise. They all said CRUISE!

So, we're booked for the same week next year. Anyone else going the same time? There's already a thread started for it. This time we've also invited the Grandparents!

There was SO much to do, we didn't seem to have time for the characters. However, I took my DD3 to the farewell gathering Friday night and it was really magical. We stood in a short line for Belle , Cinderella had no line , and Aurora also had no line ! Each of them also sat down with my DD3 and hugged her and talked with her for a little while. She was SO excited!

I missed the pirate deck party. What was the stunt that Mickey did? Has anyone seen the old show and the new show they premiered on our cruise? Is the new show better than the old one.

DD10 was disappointed she didn't meet up with the friends she had made beforehand via e-mail and we never made any of the DISmeets. I forgot the schedule at home and didn't get onboard Internet access. We did all wear lime green shirts the first day though. I almost got us a matching set of lime green Castaway Cay shirts, but DH said no. We spent enough money on souveniers and stuff, and we're going back, so I'll be better prepared for next time!


Kim

 

[Indea88]

This was our first DCL cruise on the Magic 1/28/06. I saved and waited almost two years! Well I have to tell you about our Guest service/Credit card nightmare..They swiped my Visa x2 within twenty minutes for the same amount of 500.00 then on the next day when my DH went to place 100.00 on the shipboard account with his debit card they exhausted it for 800.00. It wasnt until he tried to use the ATM at Nassau did he know. He spent the port day at guest services literally 5 hours, going through multiple managers before the money was returned which was 48 hours when we were getting off the ship. He clearly stated he would never cruise DCL again.( Not in front of the kids of course) DCL had 1800.00 on hold for 2 days!! Our servers were pleasant enough but they were soft spoken and difficult to understand. To complicate matters our toddler has Celiac disease and requires gluten free food, from faxing a medical form to numerous explanations with head server/servers they could never seem to get it to him, we tried to call at least an hour in advance! It was so frustrating. At AKL before our cruise they managed it wonderfully.Our port times were different at Key West and Nassau. Spending 16 hours in Nassau was not my favorite. Grand Cayman would have been a better port to spend these hours.Also we gave our gratuities to Guest services on the last night and were reminded by more than one CM that we should have given it directly to them. My 11 year old loved the ship and activities, and my toddler couldnt have been better cared for ,that is what mattered!!! We enjoyed our delicious meal at Palos and loved the Pirate Party.

 

[disneylady]

I, too, was shocked when we arrived and saw our baskets. I ordered them, and even convinced a friend to do the same, because of this chat board and all the raves about them. I ordered separate baskets for my DS and my DD. Each were to come w/ the Mickey and Minnie cups. Neither did. I told the lady to leave the water bottles out and replace with Capri-Suns. One Capri-Sun, 3 bottles of water in each. I was told that I'd have to pay more to include Reeses's PB Cups. THat was fine. No PB Cups. I was told each kid would get 3 tattoos. Each only got 1. I asked that they be given only the bucket and shovel and not all the other sand toys in the picture, due to space and the fact that my kids are 7 and 11, a little old for the other stuff. Well, guess what, they got all the sand stuff in the picture which they said was "baby stuff." We ended up leaving it ALL in Castaway Cay. I asked for sour worms. Didn't get any. I asked for Doritos. Didn't get any. My baskets cost me $50 each. They had less than $5 in stuff I'd requested. Oh, I forgot this one. I asked that my daughter's basket (11yr old) have the Disney coloring book shown on the website. She got the princess one instead. She took one look at it and said, "Who can I give this to?"

I filled out the online form and picked items that I knew each one of my kids would like. I faxed it in and someone called me several hours later. We went over the items for each one by one. She told me what she had in stock and what she didn't. We adjusted the items and price accordingly. To see what we actually got, it's as if I didn't speak to anyone and they just pulled a generic basket off the shelf.

They are number one on my list of people to call first thing tomorrow morning. If they charged me the $50 each, I will loose it. I will also post a warning on here to other possible customers. My friend had the same thing happen to her, which I hate, because she would not have ordered it had I not told her how much the DIS members rave about them.

 

[disneylady]

The character ops were posted. However, it does not say "which" characters will be out or how many. Plus, like I said before, once they decide that character is going back in, that's it. For example, at 10:15 Friday night, all the characters were scheduled to be out. One of the CM told me to get there early because once again they would only be out for 15 minutes.

Another example, is the portraits. Thursday night, Sorcerer Mickey was out. He was in front of the white background. The CM would not allow my children to take an individual picture with him. She said that they were in a hurry and it was one photo per family. People were hot.

Too much $ is paid for them to rush photos or expect almost 3,000 to get pictures with characters in a 15 minute time span.

 

[disneylover5]

We were 42 travelling together on this cruise. We had and an awesome time. The weather was perfect and the seas were mostly smooth. Clifford was our stateroom guy. He left us blankets folded on our bed instead of towels. I loved Clifford and asked him to marry me!! We called him BLANKET MAN. He was so awesome!!

My family was the only family that had cruised Disney before. So I too was worried that it would not live up to expectations...but it did for us. Just about everyone booked again for Nov 4th Western.

I can not stop raving about what a great time we had. For those of you that are disappointed, I am sorry.

As for the trip away from Castaway Cay, we were in Palo. The head server there said he thought we forgot someone on Castaway Cay...shows you how much he knows!!
Lisa

 

[snelsonbrown]

Disneylady,
I first started to send you a PM, but since I felt that would be not be fair to the board, I am writing you a note here. I don't know what happened but I do intent to find out - unfortunalty I had been in and out of the shop and had a help mate and you must have spoken with Rebecca. Just give me a call sometime today. I do try to fill all the request that I am given and noone really knows what lenght I have gone, to find some of the things I am asked I also try to ask everyone I speak to when they are leaving home just in case I run into a problem so that I can call them back and most of the time I ask for a cell number.
I am very sorry that you are so unhappy, but at least give me the chance to see what went wrong. I am a person that does step up to the bat and accepts responsiblity. A name is very important in life (not a business), for that is the legacy that is left to your family once life has left you. Will be waiting for you call and thank you for bringing my attention to the problem.
always
Shirley

 

[anty30]

Disneylady,
I first started to send you a PM, but since I felt that would be not be fair to the board, I am writing you a note here. I don't know what happened but I do intent to find out - unfortunalty I had been in and out of the shop and had a help mate and you must have spoken with Rebecca. Just give me a call sometime today. I do try to fill all the request that I am given and noone really knows what lenght I have gone, to find some of the things I am asked I also try to ask everyone I speak to when they are leaving home just in case I run into a problem so that I can call them back and most of the time I ask for a cell number.
I am very sorry that you are so unhappy, but at least give me the chance to see what went wrong. I am a person that does step up to the bat and accepts responsiblity. A name is very important in life (not a business), for that is the legacy that is left to your family once life has left you. Will be waiting for you call and thank you for bringing my attention to the problem.
always
Shirley

Bravo to you Shirley.